


Go Home & Draw the Curtains

by APgeeksout



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Affection, Apologies, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Tag, Forehead Kisses, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-27 23:03:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16229138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/APgeeksout/pseuds/APgeeksout
Summary: "That's what you think that was about?" He moved closer, but not close enough to touch, remembering the way Dean had jerked out from under his hand backstage. "I don't think you're tough enough?"





	Go Home & Draw the Curtains

**Author's Note:**

> Set just after the 10.1.18 episode of RAW.

"Go take a hot shower, little brother."

Seth frowned and skimmed his hat off of his head, the hair underneath a mass of frizz and unruly clumps and twists where the sweat of his match and the fight that came after had dried in the strands. He nodded dully, but by the time Roman had stepped out of his shoes and moved over to squeeze the back of his neck, he was still looking toward the door that led out onto the suite's little balcony and watching Dean's silhouette pace on the other side of the thin curtains.

"Yeah. I'm pretty ripe, I guess." Seth turned to give him a wan smile. "Just - after everything... I don't like leaving things like this." He gestured, taking in the distance between where they stood and where Dean fidgeted outside, all the cool air and brittle glass separating them from him. "I thought we were okay, but now..."

Roman thought about the tense quiet of the - mercifully short - drive from the arena: radio off, Ambrose's knuckles white on the wheel, Seth drawn up tight in shotgun, ice-pack pressed to his jaw, eyes darting unhappily to and away from Dean's profile. He kneaded a little harder into the knotted muscle at the base of Seth's neck. "For real, babe. You know you'll feel better after you wash up. Go on, and let me talk to him."

"'Cause that's never ended in a matching pair of black eyes or anything," Seth groused. Still, he did get a move on, dropping out from beneath his hand to unzip his suitcase and slowly start digging out shower stuff.

"Mouthy tonight,” he grumbled, then rested a hand on the top of Seth’s bowed head take the sting out of it. “Really, though, I'm the one who stepped on our boy’s dick tonight, and you don't have to clean up my messes.”

Seth listed back and to the side to lean into him, and Roman smoothed a few strokes over his snarled hair before he went on. “Me and him figured things out before without a go-between. That’s not why we need you now. Should never have put that all on you in the beginning.  Not starting down that same road again.”

Seth took the hand he offered to haul himself back to his feet and let himself be pulled in close. Roman pressed his lips to the worried crease between his eyebrows and felt him sigh and sink into the hug for a long moment before he let himself be nudged back toward the bathroom.

When he heard the shush of water on tile start up, Roman squared up his shoulders and went to the door that let out onto the balcony. He poked his head outside and found Dean patrolling the strip of concrete between the iron railing and a pair of patio chairs, the muscles in his shoulders bunched up high and tight - spoiling for a fight. The red ember of a lit cigarette between his fingers glowed bright in the dim light and highlighted his jittering.  They hadn’t stopped anywhere between the locker room and the hotel, which meant Dean had gone back to keeping an emergency pack stashed away with his gear. 

“Can I come out?”

Dean huffed out an exasperated breath and flung his arms out wide. “Guess you’d better. There’s some pretty big moths out here. Might not be able to hold my own.”

He stepped out onto the balcony, the concrete cool under his feet, and Dean stopped pacing and turned away to lean over the railing, the heel of the hand without the cigarette hammering out an absent rhythm against its surface. Seattle was a pretty city in a lot of places, but their view tonight was mostly of the darkened windows of an office block. Dean wasn’t taking in the skyline; he just wasn’t looking at Roman.

"That's what you think that was about?" He moved closer, but not close enough to touch, remembering the way Dean had jerked out from under his hand backstage. "I don't think you're tough enough?"

Dean took a deep drag and blew out a long stream of smoke, still looking across the alley instead of back at Roman, before he answered. "That, or y'all needing numbers for this big fucking deal match in the land down under. You tell me."

His gut hollowed out at that, then filled back up with sour horror as it sank in that Dean had somehow missed how happy they were to have him back in arms’ reach, how much better everything was with him around. That he hadn't shown it loud and clear enough to get through to his boy, had forgotten that Dean still needed some convincing that he was lovable. Loved.

"We do need you in Australia," he said, and winced when Dean's face snapped toward him, jaw set and eyes hotter than the cherry of his cigarette. He held up one hand to ward off the searing reply that was probably coming. "Just like we need you in Seattle and Chicago and Peoria. Pensacola, Davenport, Vegas. Wherever else we go. You're the big fucking deal, babe."

Dean's hard expression flickered, his jaw working a little, and he turned his face back toward the night and busied his hands with stubbing out the dead butt of his smoke. Roman dared to edge a little closer, propping himself against the rail, just out of range to rub elbows with Dean. They stood quiet, and after a bit, Dean resumed drumming out his offbeat pattern on the railing, the vibrations of it thrumming on into Roman's bones.

"I just got you back," he said softly to Dean's profile. "You're the toughest bastard I know, but that didn't keep you from getting hurt before. I couldn't do a damn thing to keep you safe then." Dean went still - or at least the Ambrose version of stillness, where he rolled out his shoulders and clenched and unclenched his fists and practically hummed with tension - beside him, and he went on. "I just couldn't stand to think about Strowman trying to put you back on the shelf.” He straightened up and turned to face Dean again. “I wasn't thinking about your match. Or your pride. I just... really needed to hit somebody as hard as I could right then."

"Then you know how I feel," Dean said, gravel-voiced, and turned finally to look at him. "Been a long fucking year, Ro. All winter and all spring and all summer, I needed a good fight.” He threw a lazy right hook into the empty air between them. “The one thing that’s always worked, you know? Even when I didn’t have anything else, I could always pick a fight."

“Sorry I took that one away from you,” he said, “but you know the fight’s not all you’ve got anymore. Right?”

Dean rolled his eyes, managing to call him a sap without having to say another word, and tipped forward to close the space between them, dipping his head to butt gently against Roman’s chest. He looped an arm around Dean’s broad shoulders and brought the other hand up cradle his head. He brushed his fingertips over the velvety surface behind his temple, freshly trimmed up again before the show, and went on talking.

“I mean, you’re stuck with me. Long haul, yessir.” He smiled at the feel of Dean’s fingers, curling into his belt loops to anchor him close. “And I know Seth will have something to say about that, too.”

Dean sighed. “Hope so,” he said, shifting to rub his cheek against Roman’s shoulder. “Cornered me in another fucking doctor’s office earlier, and I said some shit to him.”

He tilted his head to rest against Dean’s and squeezed him tighter for a beat. “Move fast enough,” he said, “and you might be able to make it up to him in the shower.”

“You’d better come, too,” Dean said, pulling himself up to his full height before he leaned back in to drop a kiss on Roman’s hair. “Only way I can promise we won’t run out all the hot water on you.”

“Be a shame to run in on you twice in one night,” he agreed.

“For sure.” Dean wound a hand into the hem of his t-shirt to tow him back across the threshold with him. “Lucky for you, you’re hard to stay mad at for as long as I want to. Shit’s a serious character flaw, Reigns.” He pulled on a fierce scowl that Roman couldn’t do anything but step in to kiss away.

"I'll work on that," he said, "if you'll work on getting rid of those again." He tipped his head at the nearly-new pack of cigarettes and book of matches lurking on the nightstand.  "Maybe, after we get the Monster and his mutts out of our way, you and me should have a big fight about it."

Dean grinned, and Roman had to kiss that, too. 


End file.
